SMALL RUMINANT RESEARCH, cilt.235, sa.107285, ss.1-6, 2024 (SCI-Expanded)
This is the first wide-scale study to reveal next-generation sequencing-based and comprehensive study to reveal
genetic diversity, population structure, and phylogenetic relationships of some of Türkiye’s indigenous fat-tailed
sheep breeds. A total of 80 animals belonging to Akkaraman (AKR), Güney Karaman (GKR), Morkaraman (MKR),
and Karakas¸ (KRK) sheep breeds were genotyped with genome-wide of 296.097 single nucleotide polymorphisms
(SNPs) data recovered from double digest restriction site-associated DNA sequencing (ddRADseq) libraries
processed by Illumina HiSeq X Ten instrument. Minor allele frequency (MAF) ranged from 0.311 (MKR) to 0.316
(AKR and GKR). Observed heterozygosity (HO) values were higher than expected values (HE) across all populations with a mean of 0.307. Negative inbreeding coefficient (FIS) values were observed in four sheep populations varying between − 0.034 (AKR) to − 0.060 (MKR). Cross-entropy criterion-based ADMIXTURE analysis
demonstrated that four Anatolian sheep breeds were represented by two ancestral populations in which GKR and
AKR were distinct, while KRK and MKR were mixed populations. Genetic distance-based tree, discriminant
analysis of principal components (DAPC), and ADMIXTURE analyses confirmed that GKR, which is believed to be
derived from the AKR breed, has become genetically different from other sheep populations. Moreover, no
migration from and into the GKR breed was detected, while a migration edge was drawn from the KRK and MKR
clade into the AKR breed by the TreeMix algorithm. This study confirmed that high-density SNP data obtained
from advanced next-generation sequencing (NGS) platforms are efficient in genetically distinguishing animal
breeds, even varieties. It is recommended that further NGS-based studies could be carried out to better characterize different indigenous livestock populations raised in Türkiye.